


The Witch in the Tower

by umisabaku



Series: Kuroko no Fairy Tale [4]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Fairy Tale Retellings, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-08
Updated: 2017-07-08
Packaged: 2018-11-29 15:40:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11443935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/umisabaku/pseuds/umisabaku
Summary: "Stories about witches are often used to scare disobedient children, wayward travelers, and others who might venture far from home into the dark, but Himuro Tatsuya has no need for such stories. He knows witches exist.He was raised by one."--Loose retelling of "Rapunzel" with a little bit of "Jack in the Beanstalk" thrown in.





	The Witch in the Tower

Stories about witches are often used to scare disobedient children, wayward travelers, and others who might venture far from home into the dark, but Himuro Tatsuya has no need for such stories. He knows witches exist.

He was raised by one.

*

The witch had been a foreigner—or perhaps she only seemed foreign because she was a witch—and it had been purely a whim of hers to teach her arts to two young boys who otherwise did not have much love in their life. She could have just as easily eaten them both—that is, after all, what witches supposedly did in the stories. And she would threaten it often enough—“Oh, you two are adorable, I could just eat you up”—and would place huge smacking kisses on both of them and say, “I still might.”

The kisses were equal parts traumatic, threatening, and oddly touching. No one else displayed much affection for the two boys, with or without threats of devouring.

She taught them all she knew. Himuro had no other family, the boy he’d come to call “brother” did not have a pleasant home situation. Learning from a witch seemed like the most practical life skill he could acquire.

Besides, he was quite good at it.

*

The thing was, his brother was better.

And in his life, Himuro only had the one thing: the mystic arts that separated him from the dull masses. He didn’t have family, he didn’t have wealth, he had no honor or prospects. The only thing he had was witchcraft.

He could hardly be blamed for his despair at seeing his brother excel so easily in the craft.

*

“Tatsuya,” the witch said. Her name was Alex, and when she wasn’t threatening to eat them or trying to kiss them she had a lot of wisdom and care. “Do not spend so much time comparing yourself to your brother. He has his story, you must write your own. You are clever—don’t be so quick to ignore what only you can do.”

Much later, Himuro would understand both her wisdom and her care, but when he was younger he was very foolish and it hurt so much to see all the power his brother possessed that he could never hope to attain, and so he replied, “You are not my mother and you have no way of understanding what it is I feel.”

*

A man with no family and no prospects and only limited witchcraft to his name has very few options in life, and the only thing really left for him to do to was seek his fortune on wild adventures. Later, it would occur to him that even then he was following Alex’s advice and attempting to write his own story. But at the time, it seemed like what he was really trying to do was make sure he did not become the villain in his brother’s story.

And, perhaps, he was just very tired of living in his brother’s story.

*

A man who is clever, and possesses some notable skill at witchcraft, can go on any number of adventures and do fairly well for himself. There were some near death experiences, this is true, but nothing he could not escape with his wits and his craft. And, after all, he had been raised by a witch who often threatened to eat him, so he had a fairly relaxed attitude towards those brushes with potential demise.

What bothered him the most through all these adventures was the fact that they always left him feeling strangely dissatisfied. No matter what riches he accumulated, or notoriety he gained, he still felt like he was missing something, but he wasn’t sure what.

It was that dissatisfaction that drove Himuro to climb the beanstalk, and later to pursue the demon he met there back to the demon’s home tower.

*

As a general rule for an adventurer, Himuro learned early on to accept any form of payment and make any trade. You never knew what might come in handy. It’s how, through a series of increasingly random barters, he ends up with a cow he doesn’t really want, now facing a man who is offering him magic beans.

Naturally, he is skeptical, until he sees what Fukui has to trade and he lets out a low whistle. “Those actually are magic.”

Fukui looks taken aback for about three seconds before he just sighs and says, “Oh, you’re one of those magic types, are you? Nevermind then.”

“You don’t want my cow?” Himuro asks.

“You’re telling me you want these beans?” Fukui says incredulously.

“I’m a little surprised anyone would trade magic beans for, let’s be honest here, not a very great cow.”

Fukui shrugs, “I’ll level with you—since you look like the tricky sort of type and I don’t want to wake up with warts anywhere I’d rather not be—these beans will supposedly take you to a whole lot of treasure. With the slight caveat of that treasure is guarded by a giant.”

“And you just trade them to unsuspecting fellows?” Himuro asks, slightly amused.

“If someone is dumb enough to trade a cow for magic beans without actually knowing for sure they’re magic beans, I figure they might as well be dumb enough to face a giant.”

“Valid point,” Himuro acknowledges. “But if you’re still interested in the trade, I’m willing.”

The trader looks like he’s questioning Himuro’s intelligence, but is too polite to say so.

Himuro just smiles. “I think it would be fun. I’ve never met a giant.”

Fukui just shrugs. “It’s your life.”

Since Himuro didn’t really want the cow, and Fukui clearly didn’t want the beans, they both walked away from the bargain feeling like they came out ahead.

*

Himuro has been adventuring so long that the idea of traveling to a different realm via beanstalk does not actually hold much excitement. Treasure doesn’t have the same enticement either. Riches and enchanted objects all come and go.

But he really has never met a giant before. It’s honestly the most appealing prospect of this whole scheme.

For this reason, he is not too concerned with the various riches he sees in this magical land—the enchanted harp, the clearly bespelled goose, the various troves of gold haphazardly tucked in various locations—but he is rather intrigued by the creature who would accumulate such things without putting much effort into keeping them safe.

He is a bit disappointed at first when he finds the owner of this land.

“You are quite tall,” he remarks, “But not quite what I would call a giant.”

“I can get bigger,” the Beast says, not even pausing from the snack he is currently munching on. “I just don’t feel like it.”

Himuro has met demons before, he knows how to recognize them by their strange hair and eyes. This one is certainly the tallest of the demons he’s met, but still rather a let-down since he was expecting a giant.

“Aren’t you at all curious as to why I’m here?” Himuro asks.

“Not really,” the demon drawls. “If you steal things, I’ll crush you. If you stay here, I’ll crush you. I might crush you anyway, if you keep talking.”

“That’s an awful lot of crushing me in there,” Himuro says with a smile.

The demon just ignores him in favor of eating his food, so Himuro takes this as permission to look around the place.

He spends a few seconds admiring the craftwork on the enchanted harp—it’s very intricate work, even Alex would have had difficulty layering on these kinds of spells. “Do you collect enchanted items?” he asks, not really expecting an answer.

“No,” comes the disgruntled reply.

“You certainly have acquired a lot of high level enchantments on accident then,” Himuro says.

“Not really,” the demon says.

Himuro tilts his head. The demon sounds bored with his response, but Himuro begins to suspect that maybe he’s just bored in general, which is why he’s responding. “No?”

“I made them,” the demon says, sounding a tad sulky.

“Really?” Himuro can’t help the low impressed whistle. He’s never heard of a demon who could work spellcraft before. “That makes you a little bit like a witch, doesn’t it?”

The demon goes back to ignoring him.

Demons with this level of spellcraft _are_ unusual. Maybe even more intriguing than giants.

Himuro figures maybe he’ll stick around for a little bit. At least until the demon tries to crush him, that is.

*

The demon is perhaps the strangest Beast Himuro has ever met. He introduces himself as Murasakibara Atsushi and he seems largely indifferent to Himuro’s existence. Himuro decides to call him by his first name because that is what Alex always did whenever she met someone new. The demon, in turn, calls him “Murochin” when he calls him anything at all.

Himuro finds that he is fascinated, although he can’t quite pinpoint why. Murasakibara doesn’t act like any other demon Himuro has ever met—he is by far the laziest; inclined to sit and eat his food and sleep. But at the same time, the immense amount of raw power it would take to create such intricate spellcraft and enchantments suggests that this lazy demon must be one of the strongest of his kind. Perhaps it is that paradox that intrigues him.

“You need to leave now,” Murasakibara announces out of nowhere, a few days into Himuro’s visit and intense study of the demon’s enchanted collection.

“Am I bothering you?” Himuro says with a smile.

“I need to go home,” is the demon’s response, which Himuro hadn’t expected at all.

“This isn’t where you live?” Himuro asks.

The demon looks sulky. “No, this is just my storage. You can’t stay here if I’m not here.”

“And where is it you live, then?”

“Not telling.”

“With other demons, surely. In a forest somewhere, isn’t that how it goes?”

“Not anymore. Kurochin made sure we can’t go back to our forest. I don’t talk to the others now.” Murasakibara realizes just what he revealed and scowls, falling silent. Himuro wonders just what kind of Beast could exile the rest from their home in the forest, but he files it away for further investigation later.

“So not in the woods, and not up a beanstalk,” Himuro continues, as if they were having a conversation, and not that he was prying for secrets. “A Beast as tall as you must like very high places; I am guessing you must live in a tower, perhaps?”

“Tch,” Murasakibara says, which Himuro thinks must mean that he is right. “Anyway, you have to leave now, Murochin, you can’t follow me home.”

“Oh yes, you are quite right. I have intruded upon you long enough.”

He climbs down the beanstalk. But then he follows Murasakibara back to his tower anyway.

*

It is very much the kind of place Himuro would expect a witch to live: completely enchanted and impossible to enter. The tower has no doors, only one window at the very top of its very long spire. This would not stop the most enterprising of adventurers, who know from stories that enchanted places hold the promise of immense wealth and glory. It would not be very hard at all for a determined young man to find a rope and climb to the top and seek what fortune might be obtained from a witch’s tower.

But Himuro is not just any adventurer, he is a witch himself, and he knows that this is not an ordinary building, no more than the beanstalk was an ordinary plant. All the rope in the world would not help the uninvited to scale this tower; there are wards all over the stones that would prevent such unwanted guests. There is a particular key to climbing this tower, and Himuro is perfectly content to sit back and wait to find out what that key might be.

He does not have to wait long; he watches as Murasakibara calls up to the window, and a long black rope drops down.

Himuro watches the demon climb upwards and waits for the right moment.

*

His moment comes two days later, when he watches Murasakibara leave. When the coast is clear he calls upwards, as Murasakibara did, using only a small mirage spell to make sure that his voice matches Murasakibara’s. When the rope drops down, he discovers that it is not rope at all, but hair. And when he climbs upwards and through the window, he finds a young girl.

“Did you forget somethi—” the young girl stops and stares at him. She must be about twelve years old, with absurdly long black hair and bright brown eyes. “You are not my father.”

Himuro doesn’t react at the pronouncement of _father_ although he certainly finds it very intriguing. “No, that I am not.”

She glares at him. “My father said I was allowed to stab anyone who came through the window that was not him.”

“Your father is absolutely correct,” Himuro soothes, “You are allowed to stab me. There are all kinds of shifty adventuresome-types who might climb through a window and wish a young girl harm. Princes and knights, and the like, all sorts of unsavory people. Stabbing is always a good instinct.”

She crosses her arms and eyes him with a haughty, no-nonsense expression. “Well then, give me a good reason why I _shouldn’t_ stab you, and make it quick, otherwise I will slice off your head.” She doesn’t have any kind of blade as far as Himuro can see, but since she does look rather eager to murder, Himuro is inclined to believe the absence of a visible weapon would not prevent her from carrying out her plans.

“Well, you see, I am neither a prince nor a knight, I am a witch.”

“Really?” she says, sounding intrigued. “Like my father?”

“Very much like that,” Himuro says. It is close enough to the truth. “I am a friend of his.”

This girl is clearly more intelligent than most twelve-year-olds that Himuro has met because she just shrewdly asks, “Then why did you wait until after he left to come up?”

“I am here to surprise him,” Himuro says. She reminds him a little bit of when he was her age, so he offers what would have been interesting to him at that time, “Would you like me to teach you a new enchantment spell?”

“Absolutely!” she says, proving that she was very much like his younger self after all.

And he is not even lying—Murasakibara is indeed very surprised to see him.

*

He’s in the middle of teaching the girl a small levitation skill when Murasakibara comes home—proving that he had another way inside the building beyond enchanted hair.

“Papa!” the girl says, losing her concentration and dropping the blocks to the floor. She flings herself at the tall Beast, who glowers at Himuro and looks very close to murdering him.

“Hello, Atsushi, it is so lovely to see you again,” Himuro says, as if completely oblivious to his impending death. “I was just teaching your daughter how to levitate items.”

“It is so much fun!” she says, craning her neck to look up at him.

“Kyachin isn’t supposed to let strangers up,” Murasakibara says.

“But he’s not a stranger! He’s your friend—right?” then she glares at Himuro, as if he led her astray.

“I would very much like to be friends with both of you,” Himuro says magnanimously.

“Kya-chan? Was it?”

“Kyabetsu,” she says, curtseying formally.

Himuro has to bite his tongue to keep himself from exclaiming. “What a lovely name,” he says instead.

*

“What are you doing here, Murochin?” Murasakibara demands, in a way that would make most men quake in their boots.

“I can’t believe you named your daughter, ‘cabbage,’” Himuro says.

Murasakibara narrows his eyes, like he hasn’t quite made up his mind on whether or not he should kill Himuro.

“I like my name,” Kyabetsu says, coming up from behind them, “It’s one of my very favorite stories. Papa, you should tell Himuro-san the story!”

Murasakibara idly starts munching on a piece of bread. He passes a loaf to Kyabetsu, and pointedly does not hand anything to Himuro. “Kyachin’s mom wanted cabbage, so her husband stole some from me. I wanted to crush them both, but they gave me Kyachin instead. Which was really bothersome, but now that she’s older, Kyachin is more useful than cabbage, so it’s fine.”

Kyabetsu positively beams at the recitation of this story. Which is a sure sign that Himuro will never understand children.

“You _like_ this story?” he says.

“It’s about me! So of course I do,” Kyabetsu says simply.

“Aren’t you upset about the fact that you’re not living with your birth parents?” Himuro inquires.

“Why would I want to live with poor thieves that traded me for _cabbage?_ ” Kyabetsu asks scathingly. “I would much rather be a witch.”

On second thought, Himuro finds that he relates rather well to that sentiment.

*

“Papa, did you bring anything besides bread this time?”

“I brought a chicken,” Murasakibara says, pointing to a rooster currently pecking at the floor.

Kyabetsu’s face falls. “But it’s not cooked! What are we supposed to do with a chicken?”

“Eggs?” Murasakibara offers.

“Er,” Himuro says, looking at the rooster. “That is unlikely to happen.”

“And I don’t really think there’s anything we could do with eggs anyway,” Kyabetsu says.

“You could, you know, cook the rooster,” Himruo says.

Both demon and girl look at Himuro like this is the most ridiculous thing they have ever heard.

“Cooking is really bothersome, and I hate it,” Murasakibara says. “And Kyachin’s not allowed.”

“I set the tower on fire last time,” Kyabetsu mumbles, dejected. Then she brightens, “Although, I did learn a very good fire-resistant spell that day!”

Himuro smiles, in a smug, devious sort of way because he loves it when things just fall in place for him, “As it happens, I know an excellent recipe for chicken.”

Both father and daughter focus on Himuro with a distinctly hungered expression.

“ _Do_ you?” Kyabetsu says, like it’s the sexiest thing she has ever heard in her twelve years of living.

“Make us dinner,” Murasakibara commands, getting straight to the heart of the matter. And then, as if adding an incentive, he says, “And I won’t crush you.”

“I do find that an acceptable bargain,” Himuro says.

*

Himuro makes sure to put on a show when he cooks dinner—with very theatrical sauce pouring and stirring and detailed presentation of food. Both Murasakibara and Kyabetsu watch, wide-eyed and solemn, the entire time and they have matched ravenous appetites when they devour dinner. Clearly, table manners are not important in the demon’s household.

“Did you like it?” Himuro asks with a smile, after every crumb of food has disappeared.

“It was amazing!” Kyabetsu says enthusiastically, around the same time Murasakibara scowls and says, “It was fine.”

Kyabetsu takes her cue from her father and turns back to regard Himuro with more detached manner. “It was fine,” she says coolly. “And you will make it again tomorrow.”

“I would love to make it again tomorrow,” Himuro says, and his eyes rest on Murasakibara. “That is, if I am staying for another day.”

Kyabetsu whips her head towards her father, suddenly very alarmed at the thought that Himuro might _not_ be staying, and while she doesn’t plead on Himuro’s behalf, her eyes are full of dismay and woe.

“Murochin can stay and cook,” Murasakibara grumbles, like he is bestowing a very great favor upon Himuro.

“Thank you, Atsushi, I’d be delighted,” Himuro says.

*

That is how they spend their nights. Himuro cooks, and Murasakibara allows him to stay for another day, and then another. Himuro makes a point to always confirm that his presence is wanted, largely because he likes hearing that Murasakibara does, in fact, want his presence.

Himuro senses, also, that it _is_ fairly significant that Murasakibara allows him to stay. If Himuro had to guess, he would hazard that Murasakibara does not trust a lot of people, and he would not let someone stay near his daughter if he didn’t have a lot of faith in them.

It seems like a very momentous thing indeed when Murasakibara heads out of the tower and willingly leaves Himuro alone with Kyabetsu.

“Don’t you ever go with him?” Himuro inquires.

Kyabetsu sighs and looks down at her shoes. “I _could._ He said I could come if I _wanted_ to. I’m not a _prisoner,_ you know.”

“The thought never occurred to me,” Himuro says, although he is lying.

Kyabetsu scowls at him, like she knows he’s lying. “I’m _not_. I just don’t _want_ to leave. I have everything I want, right here in my tower.”

Himuro tries to imagine this, and he can’t. When he was a child, all he ever wanted to do was escape.

It’s pretty much all he does _now._

“Why don’t you want to leave the tower, Kyabetsu?”

She just tilts her head. “Why don’t _you?_ ”

Himuro has to admit, he really doesn’t know.

*

When Kyabetsu sleeps, he spends his nights talking to Murasakibara. He tells himself it’s because he’s trying to discover the Beast’s secret to his intricate spellcraft, but after awhile he knows that can’t be true. (Murasakibara is not hiding anything from him: “I think of a spell, and I do it. It’s not hard, Murochin.” He just happens to be one of those rare geniuses that doesn’t need years of study or intense training for magic; it comes to him as easy as breathing).

After a few weeks in the tower he realizes it’s the longest he’s ever spent in one place, after he first set out away from his home town. He lives in a tower with a tall, attractive man, and a young girl, and when that finally dawns on him he’s a little appalled by how domestic it all is.

“Atsushi, does it bother you that I am here?” he asks one night, perhaps because he _wants_ Murasakibara to say yes, he is a bother. He wants the excuse to leave.

“Murochin isn’t a bother,” Murasakibara says. And Himuro is glad to hear that but also frustrated; there isn’t anything for him here, there’s no reason why he should stay.

Then Murasakibara reaches out and touches his hand, and Himuro meets his gaze, surprised. Murasakibara has never willingly touched him before.

“Murochin isn’t a bother,” Murasakibara says again, only his eyes are heavy with focus, and Himuro has never been looked at so intently before.

“Oh,” Himuro says. And then the only thing really for him to do is to lean in, closer to touch.

*

It goes wrong, of course. Himuro is not the kind of person who can stay in one place forever so it’s entirely unsurprising that it’s all his fault when everything goes wrong.

*

Because eventually, he doesn’t stay behind in the tower. Eventually, he decides he’d like to see a little bit of what Murasakibara’s life is like, when he’s not in the tower.

It’s almost a little gratifying the first day that he decides he will venture out with Murasakibara and Kyabetsu looks disappointed. “You’re going, too?”

“Only for a little while,” Himuro says, giving the girl a genuine smile. “I will come back.”

Kyabetsu masks her disappointment like someone who is very used to masking her disappointment. “Bring me back a souvenir,” she says loftily. “And food.”

“Naturally,” Himuro says.

*

Murasakibara does not always go to his palace in the sky that can only be reached by beanstalk. Himuro is surprised to discover that despite being self-professed lazy in nature and unwilling to work, Murasakibara actually moves around quite a lot and puts a great deal of effort into his spellcraft.

He remarks on this inconsistency of character once, and Murasakibara just shrugs and says, “I hate to lose.”

Himuro isn’t sure what that means—how Murasakibara could possibly _lose_ to anyone—but he doesn’t ask any questions. If he had to guess, he would think it has something to do with why Murasakibara no longer lives in the woods. Something to do with a demon called Kuroko who Murasakibara does not like to talk about.

Traveling with Murasakibara isn’t like the aimless traveling he would do on his own—Murasakibara doesn’t have the patterns of an adventurer. If anything, it seems like he only travels with specific purpose—to find magical objects and place them in his beanstalk collection.

It takes awhile for Himuro to understand what Murasakibara is doing, and eventually he has to ask. “Why on earth do you need all of these magical objects? You don’t use them. And half the time your own spellcraft is better anyway.” Murasakibara, Himuro notes, often improves on the spells that exist on the enchanted objects.

“Because I want them,” Murasakibara says lazily. “So they should be mine.”

It is hard to argue with that logic.

*

They always return back to the tower, to Kyabetsu. Himuro makes a point of bringing her back small things—ribbons and trinkets and the like, and at first she glares at him but then he says, “I know a good enchantment you can put on them,” and she deems his offering acceptable.

At night, he sleeps in Murasakibara’s bed, and he thinks about the wonders that he’s seen that day. When they are together, they both cast impressive enchantments, but Himuro would be fooling himself if he thought he was anywhere near equal to Murasakibara’s level.

(He is fooling himself. He is fooling himself all the time.)

It shouldn’t matter. He has a home here, for the first time, he is happy. He even, (although he hesitates over the phrase) has something that _could_ be a family, in a way. He is happy, so he should be content, and it shouldn’t matter at all that he is once again outclassed by someone else in the thing that he loves most in the world.

(It shouldn’t matter. He tells himself very firmly that it doesn’t). 

*

It goes wrong with a punch in the face, and that’s how it’s entirely Himuro’s fault. Because apparently it does matter, a whole lot, despite how many times Himuro tells himself that it does not.

They are traveling, and there is a fire. No, an _inferno._ And Himuro is not the hero type (he _really_ isn’t—he has an inherent distrust of the hero types) but there’s something about hearing the screams of panicked and dying villagers that makes him forget just this once that he’s not the hero type.

“Save them,” he tells Murasakibara, because he knows there’s nothing _he_ can do. His magic is a lying kind of magic, good for illusions, good for things that aren’t _real,_ but not the kind that could actually help anyone. “Please, Atsushi, you must do something.”

“Why?” Murasakibara drawls. “It’s a lost cause. That’d just be a whole lot of trouble and we can’t save them anyway—”

And that’s when Himuro punches Murasakibara in the face.

*

It doesn’t matter that Murasakibara is taller, stronger, and better at magic. It doesn’t matter that Murasakibara is a demon, anymore than it matters that Murasakibara is someone Himuro has come to care about a whole lot. Himuro punches him and holds him by his shirt collar and he’s not even sure what he’s yelling, (“You could do anything, _anything,_ if I had your abilities there is nothing I wouldn’t do, don’t tell me you can’t make a difference, if you put in the effort you could save the whole damn world”) but eventually he’s aware that he’s crying and Murasakibara just looks pissed.

“You’re so pathetic, Murochin,” Murasakibara says, his own version of a punch to the face and it’s just as effective.

But then he gets bigger—he _towers_ —Murasakibara grows and grows and grows and Himuro remembers dimly that Murasakibara was supposedly a giant and he had said he could get bigger and yes, OK, so that’s what a giant looks like, he probably shouldn’t have punched him in the face.

And Murasakibara puts out the fire.

*

After the fire, both of them stand there. Murasakibara has returned to his usual size and Himuro comes to the horrified realization that yes, Murasakibara was right. There wasn’t a whole lot of saving that could have been done for this village.

Now he’s alone with his lover, who he punched, and he’s remembering how he destroyed the only other family connections he had by walking away. His brother, the witch who raised both of them—Himuro walked away from them and it was all his fault, the ugliness was always him.

“I think,” Himuro says, “That probably I shouldn’t return to the tower.”

Because apparently he is still the same ugly person he always was. Apparently he can’t change.

“OK, Murochin,” Murasakibara says.

Himuro is not sure if he expected Murasakibara to stop him or not. He supposes it would have been very foolish of him to expect that, if he had.

So Himuro does what he does best.

He walks away.

*

The thing about being a wanderer by nature is that aimlessness never bothered him. Not before. It was never about the destination or the outcome or even the adventure—it was purely about living the kind of life that brought him the most joy.

But Himuro wanders. He wanders and he wanders and he wanders and eventually he realizes he’s empty inside and out but still he wanders because there’s nothing left for him to do.

*

He never realized how slowly time can pass when you don’t know where you’re going.

*

He never fully understood what it meant to not know where you’re going.

*

He eventually realizes that you can travel forever and not go anywhere at all.

*

“You are an idiot,” he says out loud one day. There is no one around him but he feels the need to say it out loud again. “Himuro Tatsuya, you are the biggest idiot who ever wandered this earth.” And suddenly nothing matters more than going back to that tower.

So he goes back.

*

He stands in front of the place he called home for a very long time. If he was a different sort of person, he might have cried, but he has never been the kind of person who could show his emotions easily. (He did, that once, when he hit someone he loved. He should have never been so stupid.)

 _What made you think you could go back?_ He thinks, and he hates himself.

He hears a noise and looks up, heart thudding rapidly against his chest. He has to control himself when he sees just a random passerby on a donkey—has to make sure he doesn’t sob, or break down, or lose himself entirely. He struggles to smile and calls out to the man, “Hello, good sir! I was wondering if you knew what happened here?”

“Here?” the man look surprised to be addressed. “Oh yes, that was quite the awful story. Have you not heard it?”

Himuro bites back a scathing _obviously not,_ and says, “I have been traveling for quite some time.”

“Oh well. It’s not a pleasant story. Apparently some witch kept a girl up in this here tower—a very beautiful young lady, as the stories tell it. The witch kept her prisoner.”

“That’s not—” Himuro once again struggles for control. “You don’t say.”

“Yes, definitely. And a prince fell in love with her, very romantic like. Just like in the stories.”

Himuro keeps himself from scowling. _A prince._ There’s always a prince to ruin things. Just like in the stories.

“It doesn’t have a happy ending, though,” the man says sadly. “The way the stories tell it, the prince killed the witch but died during the attempt.”

Himuro heart stops. His whole body is ice, and he feels distinctly separated from his own consciousness and the world around him. “And Kyabetsu?”

“Who?”

“The beautiful girl. What happened to her?”

“No one knows, sir. She disappeared. Her prince was dead, so perhaps she didn’t think there was anything left for her. Some say she moved to the desert.”

Himuro stands there, he knows he should respond but he can’t. Eventually the man on the donkey moves away, looking at him strangely.

Himuro looks back to what is left of the tower. The place he once called home is nothing but a burnt out shell.

 _Really, Tatsuya?_ He thinks bitterly. _What did you expect? A happily ever after?_

*

The only thing that matters is finding Kyabetsu. Fortunately, he has always been very good at tracking spells and locating her is not a problem.

Finding her breaks his heart a little. Which he didn’t think was possible, since his heart is already so very broken.

*

Himuro stands there for a few awkward minutes just watching her. She’s older, now—a young woman, still the girl he remembers. Only now her hair is cut short, so it reaches below her ears.

And she has a baby.

“Good lord,” he says when she notices him. “Is that _yours_?”

Three years he spent in the tower. And another three years wandering. She is not a child anymore but it is very hard to remind himself of that.

She crosses her arms and looks at him. She doesn’t answer his very stupid question, just stares at him with a kind of wariness that hurts. Finally, she says, “For a very long time I hated you and blamed you for every bad thing that happened to me.” Himuro flinches. Kyabetsu sighs, “But I eventually realized that was because it was easier than hating and blaming myself. Come on in, then. I’ll make tea.”

*

The child sits on the floor playing with blocks and Himuro tries not to stare at it too much.

“I—saw the tower,” he starts.

Kyabetsu nods, like she was expecting that. “You want to know what happened.”

“A prince happened, I heard,” Himuro says, trying to make the conversation easy. She looks like she’s about to cry.

She doesn’t cry, though. She was always very strong and now she has no choice. “A prince happened. _I_ happened. I let him up originally thinking maybe he was you, but—I don’t know. I was lonely, and he was nice, so I kept seeing him. And you know how one thing leads to another…”

“Er, yes,” Himuro says, not looking at the baby, “I’m aware.”

“But he got it in his head that I was a prisoner. He didn’t believe me when I said I wasn’t. He thought—he thought witches were _bad_ and demons were _bad_ and therefore—” her voice starts to break and she has to take in a deep breath. “And so he killed Father. It was all my fault. Father’s dead because of me.”

He hadn’t wanted to believe it. Hearing her say it makes is so much more real than rumors from a passing villager.

“I—I can’t believe it,” he says. “Atsushi is—he was—there was no way anyone could have ever beaten him. He was the best.”

Kyabetsu shrugs and turns away. “He wasn’t the same after you left. He didn’t want to fight anymore.”

Maybe she doesn’t hate him anymore, Himuro thinks, but she still wants him to suffer. And she should.

“And the prince? He died in the battle?”

“No,” Kyabetsu says dully. “He died when I shoved him off the tower.”

Himuro blinks.

She glares at him. “ _He killed my father._ ”

“You had every right,” Himuro says softly. “Did you love him?”

She shakes her head. “I thought I did, but—not as much as I loved my father. Not as much as I loved you. I wanted my parents back. I love my daughter, I wouldn’t give her up for anything, but I want my parents back—” she finally starts crying, and once she starts she doesn’t look like she can stop.

So Himuro holds her and she cries and says things that parents should, “It’s OK, it wasn’t your fault, I’m never leaving again, I’m going to make this better, I promise, it will be better.”

And he doesn’t know _how_ but he knows he’s not going to let it end like this. He’ll find a way.

*

Himuro is a witch who was raised by a witch, and he knows a few things about demons that average people do not. He knows that they live on the balance between life and death-- there is complicated magic involved, but any human might become a Beast if they are caught in that moment right before death, and maybe, maybe a demon could return to human…

He knows it is absurd. He would be too late, anyhow. Murasakibara is gone.

But he still has to try.

*

He promises Kyabetsu he will return and tries not to flinch when she doesn’t believe him. “I _swear_ it,” he says, but she has a right to her doubt and all he can do is prove it.

She told him she buried her father at the foot of the tower, so that is where he returns.

There is already someone there.

*

It is a light blue demon who stands over bones and Himuro can’t help but feel like he knows him, even though they’ve never met.

“You are Kuroko,” he guesses, because Murasakibara had mentioned him before. “The demon that drove them all from their home in the woods.”

“That is not quite what happened,” Kuroko replies, but he doesn’t explain himself further. “I had a hope for something. This is not what I wished.” He looks down at the bones, and Himuro forces himself to do the same.

“I know a spell,” Himuro says. “But I do not have the power.”

“I could make you stronger, but it comes at a price.”

There is always a price when you make a bargain with demons. Even for witches. “I will pay whatever price.”

Kuroko nods, like this is only to be expected.

*

After Kuroko leaves, Himuro casts the spell upon his body. He weaves it into his blood, into his bones, into every inch of him. He crouches over the bones of his lover and then he weeps.

He really is not someone who usually cries. He is someone who keeps his emotions hidden behind an unreadable smile. Somehow it is always Murasakibara that brings out his tears. He cries now, and tears roll from his face and onto the bones and so with it the most powerful spell Himuro has ever cast.

And when he is done, there is Murasakibara, completely human and looking at Himuro. “Murochin,” he says. “Why?”

Himuro laughs weakly, his eyes bleary. When he blinks away the tears there’s still a darkness to his left; he has lost the vision in one eye and that is a very small price to pay, all things considered.

“Because I love you,” he says. “And I should have never left.” He kisses Murasakibara on the lips and is pleased when Murasakibara returns the affection. They are not so broken after all.

When he pulls away he says, “Let’s go home.”

Murasakibara looks at the burned out tower and frowns.

“Where Kyabetsu is,” Himuro explains.

Murasakibara nods. Yes, that’s where home is.

*

Kyabetsu bursts into tears when she sees them.

“Oh, Kyachin,” Murasakibara says, sounding dismayed as he looks at the baby. “You were so useless at this age. Now there’s another one.”

She laughs through her tears and says, “You don’t need to worry about that, Father. Now that Murochin is here, he can do all the raising.”

“What,” Himuro says.

“Yes, that’s fair,” Murasakibara says, patting the small child on the head. “What’s her name?”

Himuro blinks, because it hadn’t even occurred to him to ask earlier.

“Daikon,” Kyabetsu replies.

“You named your daughter _radish?_ ” Himuro exclaims.

She shrugs. “I was hungry.”

Murasakibara picks up the baby and moves inside, already beginning to settle into their new home. Himuro reflects on the fact that he has been slotted for child-rearing duties, and figures this is fair.

He is a witch, raised by a witch, with a witch-daughter and now perhaps a witch-grandchild. And Murasakibara, who is no longer a demon, most likely is still a witch, but regardless, he is definitely a happily ever after.

So all in all, Himuro is satisfied with the story he has written as his own.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, dvd commentary on this story can be found on [my tumblr. ](https://umisabaku.tumblr.com/post/162762359754/witch-in-the-tower-dvd-commentary)Kudos and comments are always greatly appreciated! =D  
> Thank you so much for reading!!


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